The share of agro-industrial products in the general structure of exports from Ukraine in 2020 reached 45%, mainly due to more exports towards Asia.

It was declared by Nikolai Pugachev, Deputy Director at the National scientific centre “Institute of Agrarian Economics” and Academician of the National Academy of Agrarian Sciences (NAAS).

According to the Institute figures, Ukraine exported agricultural products at the sum of 22.391 bln USD in 2020. It exceeded the record of 2019 (22.35 bln USD). Thus, Ukraine has renewed the historical record of agricultural export for the third year in row.

Record volumes of export (in 2020) were observed for sunflower oil (6.9 mln tonnes) and poultry meat (431 thsd tonnes). Moreover, Ukraine supplied abroad record volumes of honey (81 thsd tonnes), canned tomatoes (66 thsd tonnes), frozen fruits and berries (55 thsd tonnes) and pasta (30 thsd tonnes).

Nikolai Pugachev

The growth of agricultural export was based on higher supplies to Asia that reached record 10.9 bln USD in 2020, up 16% from 2019. At the same time, Ukraine cut export to the EU by 11% to 6.7 bln USD, Africa – by 12% to 2.9 bln USD and CIS by 13.3% to 1.3 bln USD.

“Grain and oilseed crops, oils, residues and waste from the food industries as well as meat and by-products remained the core of agricultural export. These products covered 85% of the total value of external supplies in 2020,” Added Pugachev.